The Ring
by EraTomo
Summary: Sequel to The Betrayal. Tenten cannot forgive. And when forgiveness cannot be granted, drastic measures must be taken. NejixTen OneSided NejixHina Oneshot.


Note: I left so many questions that Tenten had to answer and I did about this sequel, I had almost NO idea what to do! I hope you enjoy the way it worked out.

P.S. If you don't read The Betrayel, this will make no sense to you.

The Sequel to the Betrayel:

The Ring

--------

Tenten wished she could scream, but she wouldn't let herself.

Her head was swimming with questions, but she wouldn't ask herself.

Her heart was filled with hope, but she wouldn't heal.

Ever since that night...

Two years had passed. She should have gotten over it when she left for the outskirts of the village. Now a solo-ninja, Tenten was improving greatly from when she was with her team, but only in skill. It didn't matter. She wouldn't go into town for anything but a mission, and it tore her heart out when she saw Naruto or Sakura, Lee or Ino, one of her old friends... did they remember her? She didn't know. She never spoke to them.

She had gone on mission to mission, all relatively easy, and had eventually saved up enough money for an axe, with which she cut trees down and made her own house. She also bought seeds and planted them, and went to the hidden oasis that was nearby for clean water. It was a tough life, but she thought of it as training.

Simple...

She pretty much couldn't read her own thoughts anymore. Anything she thought sounded foreign, and she hadn't spoken anything besides, "Understood, Ma'am. Yes Ma'am. No ma'am." For quite some time. Her voice felt unused.

She had to go back. She had to get her life back...

The torturous feelings would be good for her in the end.

...Right?

----------

Neji had sunk into a depression. Not just his regular, prodigy-moodiness. It was the full-blown I-caused-something-bad-because-I-thought-I-was-too-good-to-have-something-disastrous-happen-to-me deppression. The type were you eat, drink, sleep, and stare. At nothing.

Hinata had given up on him after kissing him repeatedly and having him not respond. He actually seemed scary. He seemed as if he was in a walking, eating coma.

The only response Ino gave her was a snort, after two years of ignoring Hinata. Ino was a true friend to Tenten, even if Tenten did leave. That only made her ever more mad at Hinata.

---------

"Sakura.." A quiet, raspy voice spoke. Sakura got the shivers.

"W-who's there? I have a kunai!"

"S-Sakura, it's m-me." A familair voice stuttered, and a person walked out of the shadows of the store.

Sakura's eyes widened as her kunai clattered to the floor.

"S--SASUKE!"

---------------

"Ino.."

"Welcome to Ino's F..." Ino's voice trailed off.

"...I'm back."

"TENTEN!" Ino shrieked as she ran to hug her friend. Her eyes stung with tears, and she wanted to scream. Loudly.

"H-hi Ino.."

"Wh-ere did you go?"

"I left."

"Where?"

"Somewhere."

"Meaning?"

"I have no clue. It's about this far that way and that far this way." Tenten made motions with her hands.

"O-okay..."

"Yeah."

"Come on inside, I need to get you cleaned up."

--------------------

Neji's eyes widened. Had he just heard some-- no, it's not possible. Tenten couldn't have been back.

Could she?

--------------------

Tenten emerged from the bathroom feeling much better than before as Ino handed her clean clothes. She started to get dressed as Ino turned.

"You know.. he's been looking for you."

"Who? Death?"

"No. Neji."

Just the word struck a knife through her heart.

"R-really?" She said, trying to sound interested, when she just wanted to burst into tears.

"Yeah... I'm sorry Tenten, I really am, Hinata gave up on him after you left, he hasn't spoken at all after you left, all he does is eat, sleep, and stare."

"Really..."

"Yeah, and me and Sakura and Temari have been really mad at her, we haven't spoken to her after what she did to you, but she might be mad at you for hurting Neji."

"...n.."

"What was that?"

"H...t...N...j..?"

"Hmm?"

"HURTING NEJI?! GODDAMN IT, HE WAS THE ONE WHO HURT ME! DO YOU THINK I HID OUTSIDE OF KONOHA FOR TWO YEARS BECAUSE I WANTED TO LEARN HOW TO DO THE ROLLER DISCO?! **HINATA YOU ASSHOLE**!"

----------

"ACHOO!" (1)

"Hinata-san, are you okay?"

"Yeah.."

---------

Neji's eyes widened. He.. surely.. it was just another mirage.. He might as well go check, just to let the hope in his heart die already. It was incredibly agonizing.

---------

"T-Tenten, really!"

"That littly slimy ass bitch!" Tenten muttered to herself.

"Yes... well, anyways, I think you need to talk to him."

"Hell no."

"B-but you might be the only to bring him out of his depression!"

"So?"

"I didn't want to tell you this, but he wrote down that on your anniversary.. he'll kill himself."

"Don't lie."

"Dammit, you always could do that!"

"Yep."

"Please talk to him!"

"No."

"Look at him?"

"No."

"Yell at him?"

"..."

"Tenten!"

"I'm thinking."

"At least go get the shop, so that news can spread that your back." Ino said as she heard the doorbell ring.

"Fine."

---------

"Tenten?"

"Neji?"

"Tenten?!"

"Hinata."

"Ino?"

"Hi!"

Silence... then:

"Tenten your back!" Neji screamed at the same time as Hinata said, "Tenten, you bitch!" And Tenten said, "YOU LITTLE WENCH!"

"Oh, I'm the wench?"

"Yes! You knew you were cheating on me with him!"

"So?!"

"So?! So it's no doubt that I would get pissed at him, it's your own fault he's miserable!"

"He won't even talk to me!"

"I don't care! It's good ridance to you, anyways. No one needs a snotty ass fake heiress hogging the Hyuuga throne."

Hinata gaped. "Oh no you didn't."

"No, I didn't. Do you want to make me?"

_"Byakugan!" _Hinata got into her fighting stance.

"You're going down, bitch." Tenten set into battle mode, drawing senbon, kunai, and throwing stars out in a blur and setting them in her teeth, elbows, and hands.

"WAIT!" Everyone looked at Ino. "Take this outside! I didn't pay the insurance yet!"

----------

"...Ready set go." Ino said hurredly. Tenten jumped and threw stars at Hinata. Then she bounced off a lamp-post and threw some kunai, then she landed and threw some exploding tags around Hinata's feet. She jumped over Hinata, throwing more kunai, and landed on the ground, turning to face Hinata, who had blocked all of her attacks and destroyed the exploding tags.

"Is that all you got?" Hinata asked.

_BOOM._

The lamp post fell apart and started to fall towards Hinata.

"No, but it's a start." Tenten said, jumping up and throwing senbon in front of Hinata to block her excape, then poofing a staff out of a hidden scroll. She landed on a rock, jumped to a tree, then skipped below the giant falling pole, which Hinata had excaped from. Tenten threw her kunai at an angle to stop the falling, then stopped her attacks to see what Hinata would do.

Hinata smirked and ran towards Tenten, throwning some kunai of her own, which Tenten diverted with her staff. Hinata then attempted to get Tenten into her range without avail.

Tenten jumped as Hinata approached, feeling something slip out of her backpack, but Hinata hadn't noticed. She threw some senbon around were Hinata was.

'Heh!' Hinata thought, 'She missed!' (2)

Tenten noted where Hinata was. She was directly under the falling pole, and Tenten was right above her, beginning to fall. Hinata smirked and widened her stance. The senbon Tenten threw came loose, although Hinata didn't notice. Tenten did, and threw some kunai right past Hinata.

'Missed again!'

"You're losing your touch, Tenten." Hinata smirked. Tenten, realizing her chance, grabbed onto the pole with her staff and pulled herself on top, acting weak by crouching down and panted a lot.

The pole slowly started to fall again. Tenten smirked as she lifted up her hands and yanked, causing the kunai that was holding onto the pole to come loose. Hinata's eyes widened, then returned back to their normal state.

"I see, some of your invisible wire, eh? Well, just trying to make that thing fall on me wont work." Hinata said, and moved to jump. She couldn't! Her eyes widening again, she looked down.

Kunai had gotten the little space of her shoes that were between her toes and the end of her shoes. She hadn't noticed! Tenten hadn't missed!

Tenten smirked. Hinata tried to get the kunai out, pulling one out and starting on the other. The pole was getting closer, closer! A few more seconds and she would be in BIG trouble. Neji wasn't even stopping it! She succeeded in pulling the kunai out, and tried to jump out of the way. Tenten pulled her arms, and Hinata snapped back. She gasped.

"No way!"

Tenten smirked.

"Yes, way."

Then Hinata fell into the ground, just as the pole and Tenten landed on top of it.

"What happened?" Ino asked.

"Simple!" Tenten said, going on the trademark Konoha way of explaining their plan after it had succeeded. "When Hinata had tried to approach me, I loosened by backpack, so when I jumped, a net fell down on that hole..."

"Wait! Why is there a hole there?"

Tenten walked over to the bottom end of the pole. "This pole used to be a tree. They just wired it to be a lamp pole. So, when I pulled it down, I knew some of the roots would come loose somewhere, because the bomb had set the inside on fire." She indicated to the small smoke plume coming out of the wood.

"As I was saying, the net fell on the hole, and I threw senbon there to secure it. Then, when Hinata had thought I missed, I seized the chance she gave me and threw kunai to lock her feet down. She thought I had been losing my touch, and believed it too. When I pulled myself ontop of the pole, it began to fall again. I had wired some invisible wire around the kunai I threw at the pole, so I just had to tug on it to release the kunai and let the pole start to fall faster. When Hinata pulled the kunai out, she saved her own life by releasing the net that was trapped over the hole, letting both her and the net fall into the hole and have this pole and me land on top of it without harming her."

"Wow, Tenten! That was amazing!"

"What, you thought I spend my time becoming the cat lady out there?"

Hinata started to scream infuriatedly, and pounding the ground with her fists, hissing death threats to anyone nearby.

Tenten turned to Neji. Neji's eyes were on the ground, not at the hole where Hinata stood, but the cold, hard ground that hadn't been disturbed.

"...Well, I'm back. You can stop being so depressed now." She said and began to go inside the room.

"...Tenten.. I'm sorry."

"OH, yeah, that will work. You know what, Neji? I'm sorry too. I'm sorry that I spent so much of my time wasted on you when you were having so much fun elsewhere. I'm sorry that my heart was shattered, I'm sorry that I had to go into a lone wolf stage for two years without seeing my friends, I'm sorry that I can never love another man again. I'm sorry that I'm completely worthless to you when next to this girl who is sitting in a hole threating to kill many different people while in a completely vulnerable state. And, most of all, I'm sorry that I ever bought that ring."

Neji continued staring at the ground. No matter how harsh her words were, he was happy that she was alive. Just so happy...

Tenten glared at him with as much cruelty as she could muster, which was a lot, and then punched him in the gut. Then she continued into her room, and lay on her bed. She said nothing, and she didn't cry. She had no more tears. She could just feel heartbroken once again.

Ino rapped on the door hours later. "Tenten?"

"...What?"

"I brought some food..."

"Thanks..." Tenten said as Ino came in and place the food on a table. Tenten ran over and hugged Ino.

"T-Tenten?"

"Thank you for not forgetting me, for being such a good friend..." She said, and began to cry. She thought to herself, 'Amazing.. I have no more heartbroken tears but I have friendship tears...'

"Tenten I know what he did to you, but he loves you, not Hinata! He won't talk to her, or anyone! The first word he's spoken in two years was "Tenten!" He's truly, genuinly sorry, we all know that! How can he prove it to you?"

"Only one thing.. but nevermind.."

"What is it?"

"He... no forget it! It was stupid anyways..."

"Tell me."

"He.. he'd have to die for me... willingly..." As Ino looked into Tenten's eyes, she could tell it pained Tenten to say that. 'So she does still like him...' She thought.

Tenten was walking in the park, two days later, listening to the whisper of the wind in the trees.

"DIE!" She turned around and sure enough, here comes Hinata. Tenten blocked her kick and punch, but got punched in the neck with her hands full. She fell to the ground, and rolled over quickly. Hinata landed a kick on her stomach, which made Tenten hunch over as soon as Hinata got off. Hinata grabbed Tenten by the hair, lifting her on to her feet. She let go, stepped back, and, with all of her might, hurled her kunai at Tenten's heart. It landed, and Hinata stepped back to admire her work. Tenten fell to the ground, and gasped.

Neji had taken the blow. He fell to the ground as Hinata cried out and ran. Tenten began to cry. "No, Neji, no! I'm sorry, please don't, oh no.. please.. I'm so sorry... I'm so sorry..." Neji looked at her and handed her something, wheezing to breath.

"Tenten.. I'm... sorry..."

"Neji I forgive you, please don't go, please, please... please... please..." She sobbed uncontrollably, holding Neji in her lap. "Neji, I love you, please.. I'm so sorry.."

"I.. love... you.. Ten...Ten..." Neji managed to squeeze out, before his eyes closed.

_**"NEEEJIIIIIIII!"**_

After sobbing some more, she checked his pulse... Gone. She looked for breath.. Gone. She could do nothing but cry now. She realized Neji had given her something before he had gone, and looked to see a black box in her hand. She opened it, and inside..

..was a ring and a note.

She picked up the note and recognized Neji's handwriting.

"The years of my life without you... I wasn't really living at all. I will never let it happen again."

She looked at the ring again, and saw something enscribed alongside it.

"I am yours, forever.

Neji."

--------------------------------------------

1) In Japan, its a superstition that when someone is talking about you you sneeze.

2) Although in the anime Tenten has 100 accuracy, it was not so in the manga, so its not stupid for Hinata to think that Tenten missed.

Um, if people liked it enough, I will write another sequel.. Either way I probably will, just because I'm having fun with this series.

EraTomo


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